We are users of PADS ES Suite and have got the upgrades till PADS VX 1.2.
We have 8 licenses of PADS ES and 4 licenses of PADS xDX Designer in our Organisation.
Some of the licenses were procured approximately 3 years back and rest of them 2 years back only.Now we are hearing that no more upgrades
would be available for this product and this product has been replaced by PADS Standard Plus and PADS Professional.
In this regards, I have few queries :
1) What is the approximate life span of a PCB Design Tool?
2) When was PADS ES Suite released?
3) What is the status of PADS ES Suite/PADS VX?
4) Why are customers/current users not informed in advance about the Product getting obsolete?
5) Why is Roadmap not shared on the Mentor Graphics supportnet website?
Comparing the features of PADS ES & PADS Standard plus,it seems to be a name change. Only 3 features seem to have been added related to Crosstalk and 3D.
It seems Customers are pushed to upgrade to new Products without much noticeable difference in the features.
Regards,
Ritu Arora
C-DOT Delhi